​Can the Dead Hang Alleviate Back, Neck, and Shoulder Pain?

​Yes, the simple dead hang can alleviate these common chronic pains and naturally correct your posture. Popularized by Dr. Kirsch, a Board Certified Orthopaedic surgeon, you’ll learn why millions around the world consider hanging therapy a SUPER exercise.

And, if you’re feeling any of these common pains, rest assured you’re definitely not alone.

According to World Health Organization, low back pain alone affects over 600 million people worldwide. This makes it the leading cause of disability globally.

Longevity to us means not just living longer, but also improving your quality of life.

So, when measuring the quality of life, one simple way is to minimize the most common causes of disability and early mortality. To do this, we use DALYs (Disability-Adjusted Life Years — the years of healthy life lost due to disability and early death).

And within musculoskeletal disorders for chronic pain, the following conditions rank in the top 3 for DALYs:

1. Lower back pain
2. Neck pain
3. Shoulder pain

Coincidentally, these top chronic pain conditions are highly associated with prolonged sitting. And as screen time increases, it’s now affecting every demographic, from our elderly to youth.

So, what’s the best solution to undo sitting?

Board Certified, ​Orthopaedic Surgeon, Dr. John Kirsch Strongly Believed…

“Hanging bars should be installed in many public places for all people to restore and maintain the health of their shoulders. Look around for an object to hang from: it won’t be an easy search! Hanging bars should be available in airport lounges, train stations, every park & playground. Such readily available equipment would go a long way in solving the shoulder pain healthcare crisis.

Man is a true brachiator. If you are a human being, you must brachiate; or, you must at least simulate brachiation by frequent hanging from an overhead bar and lift light weights to a full overhead position to maintain the health of your shoulders.”

– Dr. Kirsch

Why Dead Hang?

If you’re looking to eliminate shoulder pain, potentially heal your back pain, or alleviate neck pain, pay close attention. Below, you’ll find the truth, data, and science on how the dead hang—a form of hanging or brachiating—can restore your shoulder health, alleviate back pain, and improve your posture — all while improving the quality of your life.

You will learn:

1. What EXACTLY is the Dead Hang?
2. Why is the Dead Hang so popular?
3. 15 Holistic Benefits of the Dead Hang
4. Who is the Dead Hang for?
5. Proper Form and Technique
6. The MOST Common Mistakes (Don’t Do This!)
7. ​Comparing Dead Hangs and Pull-Ups

What EXACTLY is the Dead Hang?

The Dead Hang is a Core Isometric Exercise

The dead hang is a full-body, isometric exercise focused on passively engaging the core from your hands. While the name “dead” suggests the body is completely relaxed, there is some passive engagement of the core to prevent excessive lordosis of the lumbar spine, making the name somewhat of a misnomer.

During the dead hang, you are strengthening your grip, decompressing your wrists, elbows, shoulders, and spine, while naturally restoring your posture through thoracic extension.

An important distinction of how to dead hang and why?

For the purpose of hanging therapy, it is recommended that your feet be in contact with the ground at all times.

For the purpose of an advanced fitness exercise and for improving grip strength, remove feet support to allow you to hold your entire weight or add weight to make it more challenging.

​Why is the Dead Hang So Popular?

For the amount of time spent, in as little as 10-30 seconds, the simple dead hang delivers tremendous holistic benefits that greatly enhance both the quality and length of your life.

Here are just some of the many longevity perks you can get from hanging:

• Shoulder longevity
• ​Spine longevity
• Grip strength (a key longevity biomarker)
• Spinal decompression (recovery)
• Natural posture restoration
• Undoes prolonged sitting
• Decompresses the entire body
• De-stresses the body
• Improved circulation
• Decreased mechanical stress and inflammation
• Healing of tendons and ligaments

It’s no wonder so many longevity experts recommend the simple dead hang as a key staple in enhancing your longevity and quality of life.

And, in fact, it’s commonly suggested to be the first thing you do in the morning when you get out of bed.

What’s the Scientific Proof for Hanging as a Therapy?

Back in 2010, hanging as a therapy was first popularized in the book, Shoulder Pain? The Solution and Prevention, written by Orthopaedic surgeon, Dr. John M. Kirsch.

Driven by his promise to uphold his Hippocratic Oath to do no harm, he challenged the traditional medical system by advocating for a natural, holistic alternative to shoulder surgery. His belief in self-publishing his scientific findings to mass spread the benefits to the public, faster than a peer-reviewed paper that may potentially get buried, was correct.

Given the tremendous benefits and the likely millions of people the book has helped, his solution spread like wildfire.

What was Dr. John M. Kirsch’s Discovery?

By examining exactly how the shoulder structure moves through CT scans, he learned how to heal the majority of shoulder pain and avoid costly, painful surgery and post-surgery recovery. Through this live video feed (CAT scan), he discovered a new shoulder joint he called the acromiohumeral joint.

He observed that over time, the acromion joint became hooked downwards due to gravity, closing the space for the rotator cuff tendons to freely move within the shoulder joint. He proved that the natural process of hanging or brachiating fully opens up the joint, creating more space for the four rotator cuff muscles and tendons to move freely without pain.

His natural hanging protocol requires as little as 10-30 seconds for a total of up to 5 minutes throughout the day. His patients were able to eliminate shoulder pain and avoid painful, costly surgery, while also potentially healing back pain.

The Kauai Study (Longitudinal Study)

In his book, he describes the longitudinal study involving 90 out of 92 patients, eliminating shoulder pain. A whopping 98% were able to eliminate shoulder pain and avoid surgery. Of the 92 people, 76% suffered from shoulder impingement syndrome (SIS), and 17% had confirmed rotator cuff tears, as verified by MRI scans.

In short, if sitting is the new smoking, hanging therapy is the best solution to undo sitting.

10 Holistic Benefits of the Dead Hang

How Do Dead Hangs Benefit Shoulder Health and Mobility?

​As Dr. John Kirsch discovered, dead hangs, or hanging, decompress the shoulder joint by creating more room for the rotator cuff muscles and tendons to move freely—without pain.

In his book, Dr. Kirsch mentions that the “…hanging exercise will provide the same increase in ‘roominess’ by remodelling or reshaping the shoulder bones and ligaments and by restoring the normal flexibility to these structures.”

So if you’re suffering from shoulder pain or limited mobility, hanging has been shown to restore shoulder health and mobility — eliminating shoulder pain.

Hang Therapy as Spinal Decompression for Lower Back Pain

Not only is hanging beneficial for your shoulders, but many respondents report hanging as being responsible for healing their back pain and sciatica.

From the moment we wake up, our spines are constantly working — all day. It never gets a break. After a prolonged session of sitting for 30 minutes or more, the discs in our spine, our natural shock absorbers, lose volume and become compressed due to gravity.

Similarly, as we age, our discs become harder and more brittle. Performing dead hangs for spinal decompression or hanging therapy has become an effective and safe solution to restore the loss of nutrients and water volume. Restoring our discs to perform as their natural shock absorbers within our spine.

A study from Marietta Chiropractic showed that decompression therapy creates a vacuum effect, pulling nutrients and water back into our aged, worn discs, restoring water volume to work more effectively as its role as a shock-absorber.

No wonder many find that traction helps alleviate the symptoms of back pain.

According to Stanlick Chiropractic, traction therapy can cost up to $250 per session and require 6-8 weeks of treatment, totalling up to $7,500. Clinical studies have shown that traction creates a vacuum effect, alleviating pressure on the discs. This allows the disc to draw in nutrients to aid in the healing process. The benefits leveled off at 100 lbs of force, meaning not a lot of tension is needed to reap the full spinal pain relief benefits.

Dead Hangs for Neck Pain

Neck pain is rarely an isolated issue. And it is the forward neck posture that is a common problem.

The restriction in our shoulders creates restriction in our neck mobility. By restoring our shoulder mobility and thoracic extension, we regain better alignment and mobility in our neck.

The reality is that poor, stiff posture from excessive sitting and muscle imbalances affects the shoulder girdle and upper back. Mainly, it is from sitting in this “C-shaped” posture that is a major contributor to chronic neck pain.

Fortunately for us, hanging is an inexpensive and simple solution to create thoracic extension to open the shoulders by retracting and raising them. Improved thoracic extension elevates your cervical neck and unrounds your upper back, retracts your shoulders, improving neck mobility and reversing common tech neck syndrome.

Why is this important?

​As shown by Caring Medical found that the effective weight on the neck, which is related to the torque (or moment), increases significantly as the head leans forward.

In a neutral spine position, the head is typically considered to weigh around 10–14 pounds (lb). As the head moves forward (a condition often called Forward Head Posture or “Tech Neck”), the distance of the head’s center of gravity from the cervical spine’s axis of rotation increases. This effectively increases the gravitational moment (torque) on the neck.

Another common approximation is that for every inch of forward head posture, the force/load on the spine increases by an additional 10–12 pounds.

Key takeaway: by taking a holistic approach, you can reverse the forward neck posture and stress on your cervical spine and alleviate your neck pain and related symptoms.

Dead Hang for Posture Correction

As you might have guessed, prolonged sitting causes an accumulation of compressive forces on our spine and joints. Over time, due to gravity, this can lead to chronic pain and inflammation from your neck down to your hips.

Due to increased screen time, the average person can easily spend the majority of their day sitting. The simple, natural process of hanging can be an effective and simple tool to decompress the entire body and restore your body to its optimal state.

Sitting forces our body into an unnatural “C-shaped” posture:

• Forward neck posture (AKA tech neck) – cervical/neck pain
• Kyphosis (rounded upper back and forward shoulders) – shoulder pain
• Kyphosis of the lower back (pressure on lower discs) – low back pain
• Tight & shortened psoas (major & minor) and quadratus lumborum muscles – low back pain
  • Common problems associated with excessive sitting

The dead hang reverses this “C-shaped” posture by:

• Opening up your shoulder joint through decompression
• Retracting your shoulders and elevating them (restoring healthy shoulder posture and joints)
• Thoracic extension (lengthening and opening up your chest, reversing rounded upper back posture)
• Stretching shortened pectoral muscles due to excessive rounded shoulders
• Restoring natural lordosis (small arch of your low back)
• Decompression of the spine (gravity creates traction, allowing discs to expand)
• Stretching your tight and shortened psoas and quadratus muscles (deep muscles in your lower back and hips, common in back pain) can lead to excessive anterior pelvic tilt.

Hanging restores your posture by giving you a proud, open, confident energy and positive outlook.

Hang Therapy for Mid-back Pain

Your lats are the largest muscle by surface area in your body. As you can imagine, if they’re tight, they will excessively pull down on your entire back, arms, and shoulders.

They attach to:

• Upper arm
• Mid-spine
• Lower spine
• Lower rib area
• Top of your hip bones

Over time, a tight lat can pull on your upper arm, which pulls down on your scapula, causing shoulder impingement, pain, and mobility issues.

By hanging, you can naturally stretch tight lats that can compress your spine down to your hips.

Overall, hanging opens this entire area up, allowing for the four rotator cuff muscles and tendons to move freely—without pinching, pain, or discomfort, while simultaneously decompressing your spine.

Dead Hangs for Core Strength

The dead hang falls under generally two main categories:

1. Active Hang
2. Passive Hang

Start with the passive hang, and as you progress, alternate between the two variations to gain the best of both variations.

Passive hangs mean your scapulars or shoulder blades are FULLY relaxed. You allow your shoulders to relax and rise up to your ears or as high as they allow.

Active hangs mean you retract your scapulars or shoulder blades — backwards and downwards and hold for a few seconds as an isometric hold. This improves scapular stability and strength for healthy shoulders when performing more challenging dynamic shoulder exercises.

Dead Hangs for Grip Strength

Why does grip matter? A strong grip is widely considered one of the most reliable biomarkers of overall health, functional capacity, and longevity.

How important is it? It’s considered one of the most important biomarkers that determine your longevity. With only your VO2 max being considered, possibly more important.

As longevity expert, Dr. Peter Attia, mentions in his protocol for Centenarian Decathlon — a concept for functional fitness for aging, grip strength is a strong biomarker for longevity.

And to measure grip strength, he uses the dead hang, which strongly correlates with upper-body strength and muscular contraction.

Dr. Attia’s Dead Hang Benchmark Times (male & female):

Dead Hangs for the Quadratus Lumborum (QL) Muscle

Common low-back pain is often associated with a tight QL muscle. Your QL muscle connects your lumbar spine to your hip. Over time, prolonged sitting shortens and tightens your QL muscles. This can create tight lower back and lead to common low-back pain symptoms.

As you might have guessed, hanging therapy, which includes the dead hang creates decompresses your lumbar back by stretching out your hard-to-reach QL muscle.

Dead Hangs for Psoas Muscle (Major & Minor)

Low back pain typically arises from a complex interplay of various muscle groups. It’s usually not one specific reason, which is why a comprehensive approach is sometimes necessary.

One of the overlooked muscle groups that can contribute to low back pain is the psoas muscle.

What is the psoas muscle?

Your psoas muscle is a deep core muscle and plays a crucial role in connecting your upper and lower regions of your body. It attaches from your lower spine to your upper thigh bone. It’s a big muscle.

Naturally, it’s a key player in core for posture and movements like walking, running, and sitting.

As expected, inactivity from prolonged sitting can tighten and shorten this key, very large core muscle group. A common tight psoas is excessive lordosis or anterior pelvic tilt, common in low back pain, which can compress the discs in your lower back.

Psoas Muscle Key in Yoga Practice

In yoga, the psoas is known for its strong link to stress and breathing. It connects closely with the diaphragm through fascia and nerves, so it reacts when we’re tense. During stress, it’s often one of the first muscles to tighten.

It’s likely the reason why so many people find hanging a great form of stress relief—making it feel so good and de-stressing!

Hang Therapy for Core Strength

Many think the core only means the visible abs. In reality, your core runs from your big toe to the top of your head. These deeper muscles lie beneath the surface and are essential for posture and stability during movement.

This is also why hanging is such a powerful core exercise — it lengthens the body, builds postural strength, and improves mobility through full-body tension from your hands to your feet.

Hang Therapy for Injury Prevention

Who is the Dead Hang for?

Hang Therapy for Athletes

• Swimmers’ shoulders
• Baseball, pitcher’s shoulders
• Deadlift and Squats (dead hangs allow for faster spinal de-loading and recovery)

High-Risk Group Statistics

This NCBI paper notes, the prevalence of SIS is significantly higher in certain occupational and athletic groups that require repetitive overhead activities:

• Painters: Research Gate found that 70.77% of the painters they examined showed signs of shoulder impingement syndrome due to the consistent overhead nature of their work.
• Bodybuilders: Another Research Gate study reported that 68% of the male bodybuilders tested had positive results for clinical signs of shoulder impingement.
• Athletes: And Cleveland Clinic found SIS is common in athletes participating in overhead sports, such as swimming, baseball, and volleyball.

Given that screen time is now mobile and ubiquitous, the truth is, hanging can benefit everyone — even our youth.

Dead Hang: Proper Form and Technique

What is the Correct Form for a Proper Dead Hang?

Proper dead hang form requires hands shoulder-width apart with a pronated grip, straight arms, shoulders elevated toward ears, engaged core with neutral spine, and feet together or slightly forward. Always start with feet on the ground to control traction, avoid swinging, and focus on controlled breathing throughout the hold.

Hang Therapy’s Dead Hang Checklist:

Bar Safety for Dead Hangs

• • Always Use an Anchored Bar
  • Bar Height
    • Feet in contact with chair/bench/ground

Passive Hang

• Hand Grip
  • Supinated vs. Pronated
  • Width/spacing
• Straight arms vs. Bent arms
• Shoulder Position
  • Elevation of the shoulder girdle up close to the ears
  • Shoulder girdle neutral (relaxed)
• Core Engagement
  • Hollow Body (slight contraction of lower ribs to hips) to take pressure off the lower back
    • Low-back position
    • Pelvic position
    • Abdominal tension
• Feet ON Ground (to control traction)
• Thoracic Extension (open chest
• FHP (Forward-Head Posture)
  • Head back, chin slightly tucked
  • Eye Gaze horizontal

Active Hang

• Hand Grip
  • Supinated vs. Pronated
  • Width/spacing
• Straight arms vs. Bent arms
• Shoulder Position
  • Depression of the Shoulder Girdle
    • Passive vs. Active
  • Retraction of the Shoulder Girdle
• Core Engagement
  • Hollow Body
    • Low-back position
    • Pelvic position
    • Abdominal tension
• Feet ON Ground
• Thoracic Extension
• Cervical Lordosis vs. FHP (Forward-Head Posture)
  • Eye Gaze
• Traction Tension

The MOST Common Mistakes (Don’t Do This!)

Remember you are not doing a pull-up (dynamic exercise), but an isometric exercise.

​Try to avoid these common pitfalls to ensure effective and safe dead hangs:

• Unsafe Unanchored Equipment
  • We’ve heard of disastrous ER visits from the use of unsafe equipment.
  • Doorway pull-up bars that rest on the door trim (not safe) as the trim is decoration and is not designed to hold weight.
  • Inspect your pull-up bar and ensure the equipment is sound.
  • Always ensure you are able to easily step out of a hang and control the amount of traction
• Swinging
• Wrong Grip
• Lack of tension in your core
• FHP (Forward Head Posture, AKA tech neck)
• Lack of foot support
• Trying to do TOO much, too long…

Comparing Dead Hangs and Pull-Ups

As an isometric exercise, the dead hang is now proven to aid in healing tendon pain and ligament pain, common in cervical and back pain, as shown by the British Journal of Sports Medicine.

The dead hang is unique in that, due to our modern lifestyle causing a lot of chronic pain, it addresses challenges that are highly prevalent among adults and now adolescents. As screen-time becomes more ubiquitous and common, it’s not just causing chronic pain among the elderly or middle-aged, but also among our youth.

Hanging, which includes the dead hang, is a super therapy. It’s a simple exercise allowing us to quickly reverse the effects of prolonged sitting, achieve natural re-alignment in our posture, all while optimizing our shoulders and spine.

Pull-ups, on the other hand, are a dynamic movement. This means the body is moving through space and is more associated with hypertrophy and strength. Hypertrophy is the building of the size of the muscle.

However, for most of us, we simply want to live without chronic and acute pain, able to move without restrictions. Mobility becomes more important as we age. The dead hang may be the single most important thing we can do to move freely without pain while also extending our lifespan—enhancing our longevity (quality of life and length of lifespan).

Ready to bulletproof your shoulders and potentially heal your back pain?…

… to stand taller, with a more confident and stronger posture? Simply start hanging…

It takes just 10-30 seconds to undo sitting, so you too can start living your best version of yourself with a higher quality of life and even add years.

Start Today >> Try Your FREE Guided Hanging Protocol Now.

​Sources

• World Health Organization. Musculoskeletal Conditions (2022).
• Kirsch, J. M. Shoulder Pain? The Solution and Prevention.
• Cleveland Clinic. Shoulder Impingement & Rotator Cuff Tendinitis.
• British Journal of Sports Medicine. Isometric Exercise and Analgesia.
• Marietta Chiropractic. Effects on Intradiscal Pressure (PDF).
• Stanlick Chiropractic. Spinal Decompression Therapy Cost.
• Caring Medical. Forward Head Posture Symptoms and Complications.
• ​Kauai Shoulder Pain Study (2010). | Kirsch, J. M. Shoulder Pain? The Solution and Prevention.
• ​ResearchGate, Prevalence of Shoulder Impingement Syndrome in Painters (2020)
• Research Gate, Shoulder Impingement in Bodybuilders
• Attia, P. The Centenarian Decathlon.